Recently in Michelin Category

Michelin has awarded two stars to Frantzen/Lindeberg, a fine dining restaurant in the Swedish capital of Stockholm, in the 2010 edition of its guide to the Main Cities of Europe.

Frantzen/Lindeberg has become only the second establishment in Sweden to hold two stars (the other one is Mathias Dahlgren), bringing the total of Michelin-starred restaurants in the Scandinavian country to 11.

The 2010 Main Cities of Europe guide, which concludes Michelin's European coverage for this year, covers 44 cities in 20 countries, including one newly added city, Salzburg, Austria, where the guide awarded one star to Carpe Diem.

It also awarded new stars to Novelli in Vienna, Austria; Costes in Budapest, Hungary; Luomo in Helsinki, Finland; and Hytra in Athens, Greece.

In total the 2010 Main Cities of Europe guide includes 231 Bib Gourmand restaurants and 341 starred establishments, of which 271 hold one star (41 new), 55 are two-starred (5 new) and 15 restaurants hold the top accolade of three stars (one new). View the full list here. 

Michelin's guide for Great Britain and Ireland has awarded its top accolade of three stars to French celebrity chef Alain Ducasse's eponymous restaurant at London's Dorchester hotel.

It is the first time since 2004 that Michelin has handed three new stars to a UK restaurant and brings the total of restaurants holding three stars to four including Gordon Ramsay's flagship restaurant on Royal Hospital Road in London, Heston Blumenthal's Fat Duck and the Roux's Waterside Inn, both in Bray, Buckinghamshire.

The Ledbury in London is the only restaurant in this year's Michelin guide to have been raised to two-star-status, while 18 establishments have been awarded their first star.

This brings the total of Michelin-starred restaurants in Great Britain and Ireland to 140, the highest number in the guide's 36-year history.

Among the new one-star restaurants is the Harwood Arms in London, which sees Ledbury and Harwood Arms chef Brett Graham as the big winner in this year's guide being awarded a total of three stars at his two restaurants.

Other restaurants celebrating their first Michelin star are: Galvin at Windows, Apsleys A Heinz Beck Restaurant at the Lanesborough, and Texture, all in London, as well as the Samling in Ambleside, Cumbria, The Goose in Britwell Salome, Oxfordshire, and Paul Kitching's 21212 in Edinburgh.

Fifteen restaurants have lost their stars in the 2010 Michelin guide for Great Britain and Ireland, with the most high profile loss being Gordon Ramsay at Claridge's in London. The Capital in London, and the Vineyard at Stockcross in Berkshire have both been demoted from their respective two-Michelin-star status, following the departure of their respective head chefs Eric Chavot and John Campbell last summer.
 

Michelin has identified four restaurants as rising stars including Simon Radley at the Chester Grosvenor in Cheshire, who has been tipped as a future two-star establishment.

The Marquis at Alkham, Kent, the Black Swan at Oldstead, North Yorkshire, and Rosel and Co in Padstow, Cornwall, have named as rising one stars.

The 2010 Michelin Guide for Great Britain and Ireland has named 28 new restaurants as Bib Gourmands, a move reflecting a continued trend within the UK dining market towards competitive pricing.

The Bib Gourmand status is awarded to a restaurant offering "good food at moderate prices" at £28 or less for three courses (€40 in Ireland). The 28 new Bib Gourmands bring the total to 31. 

French chef Eric Chavot wants to launch an informal brasserie next year.

Chavot, who left his role of head chef at the two-Michelin-starred Capital after more than decade earlier this year, said he wants to launch a new venture that has "nothing to do with Michelin".

"It's still early days but I want to launch a more informal restaurant next year, a brasserie or bistrot de luxe," he said.

"I've spent my whole career cooking Michelin food and 22 years is enough - it's time for another life."

Chavot, who is looking for an investor to go into business with, added that the new venture would be a simple restaurant with a relaxed atmosphere but great service.

"It will be a restaurant version of Le Pain Quotidien and it will feature large tables and an open kitchen," he said.

Michelin has launched its first guide to the Japanese cities of Kyoto and Osaka and has awarded seven restaurants with the top accolade of three stars.

The Kyoto and Osaka guide is Michelin's second in Japan after its Tokyo guide which first launched two years ago. It published its first guide to Hong Kong and Macau last year.

Michelin awarded a total of 150 restaurants and ryokans (traditional hotels) a total of 189 stars including 110 in Kyoto, shared among 85 establishments, and 79 in Osaka among 65 restaurants.

Seven restaurants were awarded three stars including Chihana, a 63-year-old, family-run restaurant in Kyoto's geisha district of Gion; and Osaka's Hajime, which serves French food cooked by chef-patron Hajime Yoneda.

A total of 25 establishments were given two Michelin-stars, while 118 were awarded one star.

Michelin director Jean-Luc Naret said the guide presented a rich and interesting selection of restaurants symbolising the dynamic culinary scene of the two cities.

"In Kyoto we selected restaurants which offer excellent dishes by inheriting and developing culinary tradition. In Osaka, we discovered talented chefs who receive good culinary education and offer creative and original cuisine," he said."

French chef Daniel Boulud's flagship restaurant in New York has been awarded the top accolade of three stars in the city's 2010 Michelin guide.

His restaurant Daniel on Manhattan's Upper East Side has joined Jean Georges, Le Bernardin, Masa and Per Se in the guide's list of top eateries bringing New York's three-star restaurants to five.

With speculation mounting that Boulud is planning a restaurant in London next year, the accolade reinforces his status as one of the world's most renowned chefs.

Meanwhile the fortunes were reversed for fellow French chef Alain Ducasse's Adour restaurant at Manhattan's St Regis hotel, which has lost a star and dropped from two- to one-Michelin-star status.

The development is particularly bitter as the restaurant, which opened in spring last year, replaced Ducasse's previous New York eaterie at Essex House which held the top accolade of three Michelin stars until its closure in 2006.

Gordon Ramsay's eponymous restaurant at the London hotel in Manhattan's Midtown retained its two stars, despite recently reported problems of food hygiene. 

The 2010 Michelin guide to New York awarded a record 20 new stars including one new three-star; two new two-star; and 17 new one-star restaurants. New York now has a total of 78 Michelin-starred restaurants, compared with 69 in Paris and 49 in London.

The guide identified 31 new restaurants as Bib Gourmands (offering two courses and a glass of wine or dessert for less than $40), bringing the total to 85. It also selected 109 restaurants offering a meal for less than $25.

French chef Eric Chavot is leaving the two-Michelin-starred restaurant at the Capital hotel in London.

The surprise move sees Chavot leave the restaurant in Knightsbridge after more than a decade behind the stove. He will leave on 15 August.

His departure is one of a series of recent staff changes at David Levin's Capital and Levin hotels including general manager Henrik Muehle, who left to join the St James's Hotel and Club in Mayfair last month.
 
The Capital's restaurant manager, Christoph Thuilat, is also leaving to join Muehle and become food and beverage manager at the St James.

Last year, Levin's son Joe left his long-serving role as managing director at the Capital Group.

Chavot said he made the decision to leave the Capital, where he has held two Michelin stars for eight years, to change his life.

"I am leaving after ten years and my departure is amicable," he said.

"I have done everything I can at the Capital and it's been great. But I feel the time has come for me to do something different with my life. I've been doing Michelin cooking for so long and I'm not sure I want to do this anymore.

"I have no idea what I am going to do or where I am going to go. Some people may call me crazy to do this in a recession but you only live once and now is as good a time as any."

Chavot added that after his departure in August he will take time off to go on a culinary tour of England.

"For now I am going to take time off and go see my friends - Sat Bains, Nigel Haworth, Michael Caines, Raymond Blanc and David Everitt-Matthias."

But it seems things have got worse than we may have realised for poor old Gordon as news has emerged of his attempt to kiss and make up with arch enemy Antony Worrall Thompson.

For years Ramsay has been ridiculing Wozza; nicknaming him a "squashed Bee Gee" and banning him to the kitchen sink to do the washing up at his dream dinner party. "He can't cook to save his life," he's been quoted.

Oh but the tables have turned.

In an interview with Waitrose Food Illustrated Wozza speaks of how his former bully made his peace offering at the Birmingham Good Food Show, where both chefs were holding cookery demonstrations.

"He came into the room and said, 'Antony I just want to wish you luck'," Wozza recalls.

"I was shocked. I said, 'Hang on Gordon, why the change of heart?' He said, 'Well, when you are down you realise you are picking on people and you realise you shouldn't have done what you did'.

"It was bizarre. It was like saying 'I'm being kicked in the teeth, therefore I'd better not kick anyone else in the teeth'."

Heart-warming stuff, isn't it?!

Well, don't get too excited. Wozza clearly still bears a lot of resentment over the years of abuse he had to put up with.

"Gordon knows Michelin food but I have a feeling he hasn't got any depth," he snipes. "I don't think he reads cookbooks like they were novels like I tend to do. He's a one-trick pony."

Oh Wozza, can't you find it in your heart to forgive and forget?

This week's Restaurant of the Week is the Pass at the Exclusive Hotels-owned South Lodge in West Sussex.

The Pass is a new restaurant concept, I've not seen anywhere else before - the whole dining room is situated in the kitchen, offering customers views of the chefs' live action.

It's an evolution very apt for our times, when foodie customers are just as hungry for the process and personality behind restaurant dishes as they are for the food itself.
The concept of the Pass grew out of an idea for a chef's table, and expanded to its current guise as the hotel incorporated the adventurous design into its refurbishment programme.

The new restaurant is a gleaming hall of chrome and muted clattering, with a green leather banquette and facing stools wrapped round the edge of one corner allowing full views into the quiet hubbub of the chefs in the kitchen.

The man in charge of the youthful four-strong brigade is Matt Gillan, a graduate of acclaimed kitchens including Gordon Ramsay's three-Michelin-starred restaurant on Chelsea's Royal Hospital Road, and the two-Michelin-starred Vineyard at Stockcross, where Gillan worked under John Campbell.

Speculation is mounting that Michelin-starred chef Daniel Boulud is looking to open his first restaurant in the UK.

Guide Girl understands that Boulud is looking at several opportunities in London for his next venture, including the former Grill restaurant's location in Hyde Park's luxury hotel the Mandarin Oriental.

Lyon-born Boulud shot to fame not in his French homeland, but in New York City where he soon became the toast of the town after opening his eponymous first restaurant in 1993. His management company, The Dinex Group, currently includes five other restaurants and Feast & Fêtes Catering including Café Boulud, DB Bistro Moderne and Bar Boulud in New York City. He has also created Café Boulud in Palm Beach and the Michelin-star award-winning Daniel Boulud Brasserie in Las Vegas.

If Boulud does choose the Mandarin Oriental, he'll be in illustrious company, as Heston Blumenthal is set to take over its other restaurant Foliage this year.

All this exciting news! It's almost too much for this lady-what-lunches to handle...

After guides to Tokyo and Hong Kong and Macau, Michelin is continuing its Asian expansion with the launch of a third city guide for the continent.

The 2010 Michelin guide for Kyoto and Osaka, which will be published in October, is the second Japanese guide after the Tokyo guide was first launched two years ago.

Tokyo debuted with 191 Michelin stars, more than any other city in world, in 2008.

The 2009 guide awarded even more stars, with a record of 227 stars given to the 173 restaurants it lists, a total constituting more stars than Paris (99), London (60) and New York (56) combined.

It remains to be seen whether Kyoto and Osaka will repeat the success of Tokyo, but one thing that seems clear is Michelin's continued drive to become the world's benchmark when it comes to rating restaurants.